Great Lakes salmon stocking slips in '06

November 20, 2005|LOUIE STOUT Tribune Correspondent

Lake Michigan fisheries management agencies have agreed to implement a 25 percent stocking reduction of Chinook (king) salmon. Beginning next spring, 3.2 million Chinook salmon fingerlings will be stocked by Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois and Indiana, a reduction of just over 1 million fish from 2005. In order to meet the 25 percent lake-wide reduction, agencies agreed to reductions in the amount of 30 percent for Michigan, 21 percent for Wisconsin, 17 percent for Illinois and 12 percent for Indiana. Michigan is taking a larger portion of the lake-wide cut because its rivers provide the bulk of the naturally produced salmon found in Lake Michigan. Dwindling forage -- principally alewives -- and the chinook's voracious feeding habits are key reasons for the cutbacks. Lake Michigan scientists fear a crash of the forage base could result in widespread disease within salmon and other species. "This action has strong support of the angling community, which recognized the need to be pro-active in order to meet most of our objectives," said DNR Lake Michigan Basin Coordinator James Dexter, who chaired the Lake Michigan Committee. "By reducing predator abundance to better balance the fish community, especially available prey, we anticipate better results for ecosystem management, including rehabilitation of native species." The agencies provided several opportunities for public input throughout the year beginning with a full scientific review of lake-wide data at a spring conference in Benton Harbor. Throughout the review process, several key concerns by anglers were discussed. Anglers suggested increasing the bag limit for Chinook salmon as a way to reduce the number of predators in the lake and possibly allow for a smaller reduction in stocking. Managers, however, do not believe higher bag limits would substantially reduce alewife predation, so it was not embraced as an alternative to reduced stocking, Dexter said. Bag limits differ among states, and, in contrast to stocking levels, have not usually been considered subject to interstate negotiations. Other anglers' concerns included where stocking reductions would actually occur, noting that certain areas in the basin have good natural reproduction of Chinook salmon. Anglers also placed a high premium on maintaining diverse fisheries, including fall fisheries when salmon return to sites where they were stocked. Many anglers also called for increased stocking efforts of other salmon and trout species that do not impact alewife populations nearly to the same extent as Chinook salmon. However, agencies are limited in their ability to rear additional coho, brown trout or steelhead. Those species require more time in hatcheries than Chinook, thus the abilities to produce additional fish are constrained by hatchery capacities. Turkey donationWanted: Sleepy bearsLouie Stout: Lstout@net-link.net